The First 200-MPH Hot Rod: So-Cal Streamliner

We’ve seen those faded old HOT ROD covers and photos of the fabled So-Cal streamliner in hot rod history books so often that, 65 years later, the Bonneville race car lacks a certain amount of impact—until you see it for real. The car that in 1950 became the first hot rod to run faster than 200 mph. The icon that appeared on three different covers of HOT ROD. To see and touch it more than 60 years after it was destroyed and sold for scrap would be impossible were it not for an obsession with spotlighting the efforts of early hot rod pioneers—and a singular aim to go back in time to see how the cars looked—carried out by Burton, Michigan’s Dan Webb. Dan agonized over those covers and old photographs and had hundreds of phone conversations with So-Cal Speed Shop founder Alex Xydias to create what was lost to time back in 1951.

2/20All the hose clamps, hoses, and wiring are correct to 1949. All wiring and tie-wrapping chores were performed by Webb’s son-in-law, Cory Taulbert.

We’re familiar with its image now, so it’s hard to imagine how this car was viewed by hot rodders—or, more importantly, by the general public—when it was new. Hot rodders had that nasty reputation: guys who messed with old cars were miscreants, juvenile delinquents who clobbered junk together and did dangerous things with it. Or so the public thought. But if hot rodders created something like the So-Cal streamliner—powered by a pedestrian Mercury stuffed into a Model T frame—and made it exceed 200 mph at Bonneville, it would paint a different picture of those crazy kids with fast cars and loud music.

3/20This flared-exhaust detail was not evident on earlier iterations of the ’liner but looks more finished than the exhaust poking out of a hole in the body, as previously configured.

With Robert Petersen’s HOT ROD magazine having immediate success after its inception in 1948, and first editor Wally Parks coming from a lakes racing background, it was inevitable that the two, along with Petersen’s company manager, Lee Ryan, would devise a speed trial for hot rodders to allow unlimited boundaries to the builders’ imaginations. Safety would be as predominant as they could make it back in the ’40s—which was a hair better than no safety at all. The three went to Salt Lake City, where they got approval from the Chamber of Commerce for a speed trial “test” at the Bonneville Salt Flats in late August 1949.

4/20The wheel blisters were redesigned before the first Bonneville attempt, and these replicate that iteration of the car.

Once announced in the May ’49 HOT ROD, racers, including the proprietor of So-Cal Speed Shop in Burbank, California, knew what a huge opportunity it was. Alex had been supplying speed parts and advice for a couple of years and wanted an exciting entry to help spotlight his business. Dean Batchelor, one of So-Cal’s first customers and sponsorship recipients, came to Alex with his ideas and, more significantly, his money. The deal was that Batchelor would sell his ’32 roadster, and Alex would supply his belly-tank lakes racer as the basis for a new race car.

Dean had spent time in Germany as a prisoner of war, and it was during this time he became enamored with the Auto Union vehicles with their enclosed wheels. There had been many streamliners built over the years, including Road Runners club member Jack Harvey’s and one from the Mobilers club’s Spalding Brothers, both in 1939. And, of course, there were the big boys like Henry Seagrave’s Golden Arrow in 1929 and Sir Malcolm Campbell’s Bluebird in 1935, which were ponderous automobiles with large-displacement V12s and without fully enclosed wheels.

Dean and Alex had a different image in mind for their car, drawing inspiration from Lt. Colonel Goldie Gardner’s MG-powered EX-135 with a body designed in 1938 by Reid Railton, who had also designed land-speed cars for the legendary John Cobb and Sir Malcomb Campbell. Just as the So-Cal streamliner would be starting with an existing chassis, so too had the EX-135—originally raced beginning in 1934. The EX-135 placed the driver toward the back of the car, but the So-Cal streamliner would have the driver forward of the engine because that’s how the chassis had been built when it was run as a belly-tanker by Bill Burke.

5/20An original bomber seat, lap belts, and B-26 bomber wheel were used in the re-creation, with the seat and belts coming from Gary Schroeder. The seat was slightly cut down as was done in original car, and the upholstery is by Sid Chavers.

Valley Custom in Burbank built the body to Batchelor’s specs. It was a seat-of-the-pants concept with no real data to either support or dispel the aerodynamic characteristics of the body Neil Emory hammered out of aluminum. Emory crafted the complex nose and tail while Alex, Dean, and friends handled the simpler body panels between the two ends.

Power was from the same 156ci V8-60 Ford flathead that had been in the car when it was a belly tank. Modifications included Edelbrock’s heads and intake, a Winfield cam, and Kong ignition. Midget racing was huge at the time, and several Midgets ran V8-60s, so many builders were familiar with them and plenty of speed equipment was available.

6/20The Mercury engine is an exact match to the original Edelbrock-built mill, including a 4-inch stroke, Kong ignition, and an Edelbrock intake with three new Stromberg 97s. It was completely balanced and assembled by H&H Flatheads.

Alex says, “We wanted to build something more exciting than a belly-tank lakester, but many were skeptical of the car. It looked like a big shoebox to some, and many thought we were going the wrong way and that open wheels were the better direction.”

Between June and August 1949, the streamliner was taken to four different dry-lakes points meets to allow Dean to get used to the car. During their last meet before Bonneville, the team ran a two-way average of 138.74 mph—not spectacular, but good enough to set a new SCTA record in their class.

Drama at Bonneville was preceded by drama en route, when the tow rig jackknifed and damaged the streamliner. Luckily, it was minor, and it was repaired for its Salt Flats debut, where it ran an average speed of 156.39 mph. Back in the pits, the So-Cal team met with Bobby Meeks and Don Towle from Edelbrock, who suggested they replace the V8-60 with their Edelbrock-built Mercury flathead that packed a minimum of 100 hp more than the little V8-60.

7/20A louvered belly pan ran the full length and width of the streamliner and was sheared off in the Batchelor crash.

8/20With no rollbars or bumpers, the So-Cal streamliner takes on the most slippery shape imaginable. The crowned surfaces were originally created at Valley Custom in Burbank and were confined to nose, tail, and wheel blisters. All the other panels were rolled or flat and were handled by the So-Cal crew to costs.

“The engine fit pretty well,” Alex remembers. “Of course, we had to change the motor mounts, but the bellhousing fit right up. We had a little work to do to mate up the water pumps, but it was a fairly easy change.” They did all that right there on the lakebed. A full-throttle pass Friday morning netted 185.95 mph by Dean, backed with a 187.89 return run driven by Alex.

The next day, Dean hit 193.54 mph with a two-way average of 189.74 mph for a record, winning numerous awards including HOT ROD’s Top Time trophy bestowed retroactively in 1950 for the 1949 feat. Alex says, “You know, we would have been happy with 165 mph. That would have beat the record, and we would have been the world’s fastest hot rod. The increase in speed with the Edelbrock engine was so dramatic—we just never expected that.”

9/20This shows the tight quarters. Webb says, “You get a weird sense of safety, like you’re sitting in a nice cocoon—until you realize there’s no rollbar.

Hitting 200 mph seemed like a distinct probability for 1950. With much anticipation, the streamliner was ready for the first lakes meet in May 1950. On a return run after a 152.82 pass with the V8-60 back in place, the streamliner was whipped by a crosswind and got crossed up. The exhaust pipe dug in, and the car rolled once, landing on its wheels. Though Dean was knocked unconscious, his injuries were limited to a bad cut above his left eye, the result of his goggles jamming against the steering wheel when the car landed on terra firma after the flip. With no shoulder harness and no rollbar, there must have been a lot going through Dean’s head in those brief seconds of mid-flip. Realizing his fortune, he quit racing.

The damage to the ’liner was repairable, but the second Bonneville National Speed Trials was now only four months away, and it took that much time to get the car ready. Arriving in primer with “2” painted on the sides, the car now had a pair of drivers who would take turns. Bill Dailey, a friend of Alex, and Ray Charbonneau, a friend of Batchelor, drove a two-way average of 208.927 for the record in Class C, and also the HOT ROD Top Time trophy. It was an incredible feat for a small group of hot rodders. HOT ROD proclaimed “210 MPH” on its Nov. ’50 cover.

10/20The fire extinguisher was another swap-meet find that matches the original perfectly.

“Fastest Car Ever Built in America” was how NASCAR described the ’liner in promotions for their Speed Trials at Daytona Beach, Florida, in February 1951. With Batchelor staying back, Alex, Keith Baldwin, and Bill brought the car to the beach. A clear canopy was added to promote airflow, and “HOT ROD Magazine” was painted on the sides. However, “So-Cal” was painted over the HOT ROD logo on the side facing the cameras, as NASCAR capitulated to Speed Age’s protests that an upstart magazine would be promoted at an event covered for NASCAR by Speed Age.

“You know, Pete [Robert Petersen, founder of HOT ROD] was a dear friend, but I always used to say that, yes, Pete sponsored us, but we ran out of his money in Blythe [in the desert outside California],” Alex jokes.

11/20Ashley Webb remembered seeing an ad posting for this wheel years earlier and was able to track down the “wall hanger” and convince the owner to sell it. Where do you find a B-26 bomber yoke today if you need one?

Initially, the ’liner made a couple of passes in the 120-mph range. The course was rough—that course being the beach. The cars ran fairly close to where the ocean water lapped onto the sand, because that’s the hardest and smoothest part of the beach. Still, it was a bumpy ride for the first three days of attempts.

On the fourth day, Dailey went for it, and disaster struck. At an estimated 150 mph, the car endo’d. Speed Age reported that the car hit a patch of water, veered to the right, then “hurled 150 feet through the air before its first crash, and a total of 740 feet to its final stopping place.” Though in a coma for a month, and with a fractured skull and broken shoulder, Dailey survived. The car was pulled off the sand, the engine returned to Edelbrock, and the rest sold for $4 as scrap. You could barely tell it was ever a car.

12/20This is the actual timing plaque given to Alex Xydias for his car’s record 210-mph Bonneville run. Alex gave this to Dan during construction.

Ever since then, we’ve all seen those small black-and-white paper images and could only imagine how it must have been. Thanks to Dan and company, now we can. You can’t imagine it until you see it. It’s almost Martian—you know it’s a car, but it is otherworldly when it’s sitting in front of you.

Builder Dan Webb knew he wanted to build the ’liner as a homage to Alex and Dean and maybe all of those who paved the way before us. Says Dan, “I give those guys a lot of credit back then. Of course, they didn’t know they could get hurt in it.”

13/20In keeping with the spirit of the re-creation, Craig Naff gas-welded the body together as was originally done by Neil Emory back in 1949 (as opposed to today’s more typical TIG welding).

Dan has built quite a few cars over the years, including a Ridler-winning roadster in the ’90s, but more recently a string of cars with handbuilt bodies, including a roadster for his daughter, Ashley, and a modern interpretation of Harry Miller’s Golden Submarine race car and a re-creation of Phil Remington’s pre-war lakester.

So does Dan like re-creations better than his own creations? “Doing re-creations is a lot harder because everything has to be as close as possible to the original. Also, I’ve done enough of these that the guys with the rare vintage parts can see me coming. But it’s a gray area. The purists go, ‘Yeah, that’s neat, but it’s not the real thing.’ I want people to be able to walk up to the thing and touch it—but you can’t because it’s gone, so I re-created it for those people. The purists can go back to their original HOT ROD magazines and look at the real pictures.”

14/20

About his more recent creations, Dan is proud of the small group of craftsmen he uses, the same group for each car. Besides his daughter, who located many of the hard-to-find parts—like the B-26 aircraft yoke used as the steering wheel, Kong ignition, and vintage gauges—his team includes his son-in-law, Cory Taulbert, doing the vintage wiring, and Tracy Aitken, who wears many hats.

15/20

16/20May 7, 1950, El Mirage Dry Lake: Dean Batchelor in the final moments of the crash leading to his retirement from racing. Captioning this photo for his book, he wrote, “I learn why one should never drive a light, aerodynamic car with tail-heavy weight distribution in a crosswind.”

The first thing I thought of when I saw Dan’s re-creation was, Gee, we built that in 1949. It was beautiful. I was taken aback by what a bunch of kids had come up with.

Craig Naff in Virginia handles the amazing sheetmetal work; Sid Chavers (SidChaversCompany.com) in San Francisco gets the nod for upholstery; H&H Flatheads (Flatheads-Forever.com ) in La Crescenta, California, has built a number of vintage engines for Dan; Gary Schroeder at Schroeder Steering (SchroederSteering.com) in Burbank, California, supplied the original bomber seat and vintage seatbelts (“Gary has a couple of everything”); Hot Rod Works (HotRodWorks.com) in Caldwell, Idaho, rebuilt the Halibrand Model A quick-change; Josh Shaw hand-painted the lettering; Coker Tire (CokerTire.com) supplied the 16- and 18-inch tires; and Dupont is used for coatings.

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Both the original and re-creation took about the same amount of time to construct. Dan says, “We built this from start to finish in a little over three months.” He means 62 years and three months.